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Errant companies owe GFC $56M
Dec 15, 2008 News
There is an outstanding $55.9M owed to the Guyana Forestry Commission by companies that were fined earlier this year following the discovery of breaches within their forestry concessions.
Kaieteur News was told that of a total of $321.3M, some $265.4M has been paid to date.
A source within the body says that all of the companies have been in compliance with their payment schedules, with the exception of Willems Timber & Trading Company Ltd., which is $6M behind scheduled payment.
The GFC, this newspaper understands, has been assured by the CEO of that company that all outstanding payments will be made by December 31.
Companies such as Guyana Sawmills, Caribbean Resources, Interior Forestry Industries and Vergenoegen Sawmills have already completed paying their fines.
Other companies, such as Toolsie Persaud Limited, are on schedule with their compensations.
On August 6 last, all the companies that were fined were summoned to a special meeting after some were defaulting in the payment of their fines to the GFC.
These forestry concessionaires were fined for breaches in harvesting regulations.
However, many of those fined failed to honour their obligations of paying their fines.
This had forced Agriculture Minister Robert Persaud and Commissioner of Forestry, James Singh, to meet with a number of representatives from the defaulting companies to discuss the issue of payment of the fines.
All of the companies had until the end of September to submit post-dated cheques for their outstanding balances.
Should all outstanding fines not be paid, companies will not have their Timber Sales Agreements or Wood Cutting Licenses (WCL) renewed in 2009.
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